On Saturday, the eve of the 70th anniversary of her accession to the throne, Queen Elizabeth II paved the way for Camilla, Duchess of Co...
On Saturday, the eve of the 70th anniversary of her accession to the throne, Queen Elizabeth II paved the way for Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, who will be called Queen once Prince Charles becomes King of Britain.
In a statement, Elizabeth, 95, said it was her “sincere wish that, when the time comes, Camilla will be known as Queen Consort as she continues her own loyal service”. A consort is the partner of the ruling monarch.
The announcement appeared to solve a sensitive issue for Camilla, the second wife of Prince Charles, who is Elizabeth’s eldest son and heir to the throne. The two were romantically involved during Charles’ marriage to Diana, Princess of Wales, who was killed in a car crash in 1997.
Camilla, who married Charles in 2005, has long been reviled by British tabloids, who sometimes called her the country’s most hated woman. It had been widely speculated that she would hold the title of princess consort, and not queen consort, once Charles became king.
But Camilla has become more popular with the public over the years. Elizabeth recently appointed she a royal lady of the most noble order of the garter, a strong show of support.
In her Saturday message, which she signed ‘Your handmaiden Elizabeth’, the Queen said she was ‘eternally grateful’ and ‘humbled’ by the support she received from around the world during her reign, which has started seven decades ago on Sunday on the death of his father, King George VI.
“And when, in due time, my son Charles becomes king, I know you will give him and his wife Camilla the same support you have given me,” she said in the statement.
The royal family has been the source of much recent intrigue. Elizabeth’s second son, Prince Andrew, is being sued in New York by a woman who says she sexually assaulted her when she was a teenager, and the Queen recently stripped him of his military titles. In March, Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, who is biracial, gave a sensational interview to Oprah Winfrey in which the couple accused the Royal Family of insensitive and racist behavior towards them.
The 70th anniversary of the Queen’s reign, known as her Platinum Jubilee, comes at a dark time for Britain as a whole, battered along with the rest of the world by two years of a devastating pandemic. The country’s prime minister, Boris Johnson, is embroiled in a scandal boozy evenings who violated lockdown restrictions.
But the queen put an optimistic note in her message. “The past seven decades have seen extraordinary social, technological and cultural advancements that have benefited us all,” she said, adding that she was “convinced that the future will bring us similar opportunities.”
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